Drabble, snippets & other shorts
by Dark Kuno
Summary: A collection of unrelated drabbles, snippets and other short story segments not long enough to be full one-shots Most of these will have come from an IRON Chef challenge at PPMB.
1. Mack's Conffession

This was mini-story concept created for the Iron Chef: Lawndale Confessional on PPMB

The basic premise was video confessionals for the kids to get things off their chest in private. The theme of this would be Mack in a booth looking at the camera and "thinking" out loud.

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><p><span><strong>Mack<strong>

The real reason I can't stand it when Kevin calls me "Mack Daddy" has nothing to do with Kevin at all. It's probably just something he heard or saw that managed to get lodged in what passes for his brain next to the spot his mind uses to reference me. It has everything to do with Summer before our sophomore year. Kevin's folks decided to spend the entire season at his grandmother's beach house in Florida, and Jodie was doing a Summer student internship in DC with some senator.

We were both lonely and there. Things kind of just happened. And then they happened again, and again and again. Two and a half months, of mind-blowing, wall cracking, bed breaking sex. To this day, I have absolutely no clue why the hell Kevin cheats on that woman. And I do mean woman. I refuse to call anyone built like that, with that much skill at pleasing a man, "girl".

But, it wasn't just the sex. After, we'd talk. It was kinda scary when I realized how much alike she and I are. Our situations that is. Turns out, she cheats on Kevin because he cheats on her. She tries to make him jealous so he'll pay more attention to her. She actually does care about him, in her own special way, but she made it clear she doesn't think she's really in love with him. Kind of the way I care about Jodie I guess. I guess we handle our romantic neglect in different ways.

Anyway, right before school started back up, we found out that there was a bit of a... situation. Yeah, that kind of situation. I know we made the right decision. I don't doubt that. Anyway, we don't talk about it, and no one else knows. We both try to avoid each other these days. It's just too awkward. But I will probably always wonder, "What if..." You know?


	2. Vincent's Voicemail

This was a short created for the 2009 Iron Chef: Beeeep! on PPMB

The basic premise was to create fictional commercials based on the humorous AT & T commercials where a person would narrate over shots of themselves getting into trouble and/or bad situations due to dropping AT&T for cheaper phone service.

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><p>We see a tall, olive complexioned, black-haired, mustached man wearing a pair of khaki shorts and a multi-pocketed vest standing on a beach from a side view. He is setting up an expensive looking camera on a tripod at the water's edge.<p>

He is looking out over a scenic view of the beach houses and hotels, with his back to the ocean.

The camera shifts to view the beach houses, hotels and the man's back.

Another copy of the man steps into scene from the left holding a pipe in one corner of his mouth.

BEEP!

"Hello. You've reach Vincent Lane... He can't answer your call right now because the cheap phone service he switched to doesn't offer international calls as part of the basic package."

In the background you see Vincent-1 rummaging through a camera bag and lifting out several different camera lenses.

Vincent-2 lights his pipe and waves the match out to extinguish it.  
>"So, Jane, we won't be getting that message from you with the reports of Tsunami warnings your friend Daria told you about here in Indonesia."<p>

Vincent-1 looks down at his feet wondering where the surf that was just lightly splashing his feet, went. He scratches his head and shrugs.

Vincent-2 looks back over his shoulder at Vincent-1 and shakes his head.

"Maybe if we make it back we'll look into switching back to Transcom, since their 'World Trek' package comes with international service standard and is only $20 more than the basic package per month. I may even look into the low cost satellite phone upgrade they're offering for a limited time."

A small string of text displays at the bottom of the screen giving the date that the offer ends, and the url for details on the Transcom website.

"Looks like we're going to find out if that phone we got from the other company's waterproofing was depth tested like Transcom's 'Super Traveller' models were."

Vincent-2 walks off camera and we see the camera swing around to look out at the ocean. A massive wave is beginning to form in the distance. Vincent-1 turns around, gapes at the sea for a moment. He then turns and begins to run screaming, dropping camera equipment as he goes. He runs toward the screen until it goes black as he runs into it.


	3. Dread Pirate Jake

This was a drabble created in one of the Scenes No Daria Fanfic Should Have threads on PPMB back in 2009

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><p>Helen sat in the beautifully hand carved chair at her equally beautiful matching desk. Her thoughts lingered on the hastily truncated ceremony that had wed her to Prince Eric.<p>

With a resolute sigh, she carefully removed the silver dagger from its gold case. With a firm grip she turned the blade and let its point rest on her ample bosom, just over her heart.

She squeezed her eyes closed and took a deep breath in preparation for the plunge that would end her life, but stopped in shock as the familiar voice called out from behind her.

"There's a shortage of perfect breasts in this world. It would be a pity to damage yours."

Helen turned in her chair towards the voice behind her. Her eyes widened as the dagger fell from her hand.

"Jakey!" she exclaimed as she lept from her chair and embraced the black clad Jake, who lounged casually on her four post bed.

'Yes, perfect breast indeed,' thought Jake with a grin as Helen began smothering him with kisses. 'Sometimes, I love being the hero.'


	4. Endings are actually Beginnings

This one-shot created for the Iron Chef: The Celeb Interview thread on PPMB back in 2009

The premise was that instead of being an animated sitcom, Daria was instead an actual reality TV show on MTV (and a real one in the way the original Real World was).

The fics were done as if they were media reps and reporters interviewing the cast, crew, and other associates after the end of the show.

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><p>Endings are Beginnings<p>

I sat in my hotel room and stared at the screen of my laptop.

The cursor blinked back at me, unmoving as it had for the past hour. I leaned back in my chair and let out a frustrated sigh.

Nothing.

That's exactly what happened, as it had the five times I tried before to produce anything of value for this assignment.

My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of my cell. I picked it up and answered, glad for a distraction of any kind. My elation was short lived as soon as I realized it Ed Handley, my producer, on the other line.

"How's it coming?" I asked incredulously. "It's not."

He rambled of his usual tirade about deadlines. I'd long ago become immune to his pressuring after my second Gemini.

"Look Ed," I said angrily. "This isn't some fresh out of college intern you've got out here. This is me. I just spent two hours of my life that I desperately wish I could, but sadly know that I will never get back. There's nothing usable for the interview that won't have people changing the channel after the first minute. If you don't believe me, I'll happily get Danny on the line so he can tell you exactly how much of his video footage he thinks is usable for the spot."

More argumentative rambling issued from the receiver. I rub my eyes in the vain attempt to stem the coming headache. After 3 minutes of half-way listening to Edward complain, threaten and yell; I'd had enough.

"You know what Ed," I interrupted. "You can yell, piss, moan and whine until Judgment Day. It won't change the fact that I'd have been better off interviewing the dead armadillo I saw on the side of the road on the way back to the hotel."

Ed started yelling again. I put the phone down and stood up to stretch my tired legs. While the sounds of Ed yelling into the phone continued, I paced around the hotel room rubbing the back of my neck. My eyes rested on my digital recorder and an idea formed.

"Ed… Ed!... ED!," I yelled to interrupt his tirade. "Look, we're on the company dime so we can keep this line open as long as needed. I've got my audio from the interview with me now. You listen and as soon as you find something usable to print in the interview let me know."

I plugged my cell phone's AC adapter in and hit the speaker phone button.

"Can you hear me?" I asked as I toggled through the recorder's controls.

"Yeah, I can hear you," came Ed's impatient response.

I adjusted the volume on the recorder, hit the play button and set the device near my phone.

"So. I know everyone is excited about the release of the Daria: The Complete Series this month. I'm sure fans of the show would love to hear what the star's oldest friends think about the show's re-release."

"Uhhhhhh... we're gonna like get paid for this right?"

"Hehehe, yeah money… money… money…"

"Shut up Beavis! I'm the one getting paid."

"Whatever, Fart-knocker! I want some money too! My Mom's medicine costs a lot"

"Uh huh huh huh. I've got your mom's medicine… uh huh huh huh… Come to Butt-Head."

"Shut up!"

sound of a scuffle and smacking

"Gentlemen! You'll both be compensated for your time."

"Hehe he,. I was constipated once after I ate a bunch of nacho cheese. He hehe… POOP!"

"Uh huh huh huh. You were in the bathroom for an hour and couldn't go. Uh huh huh huh."

"Compensated, not constipated…Both of you are going to be paid! Now about Daria..."

"Huhhuhhuh huh. Diarrhea… Huhhuhhuh huh."

The cell phone's speaker function was the best on the market. I could hear the fan in Ed's office, so I knew he was still on the line, probably stunned into silence as I was at the pure level of idiocy and immaturity generated by each word uttered by the two men I'd been sent to interview. I calmly and as quietly as I could, crept out of the hotel room and silently closed the door. I needed to get out of that room before I lost it. And listening to those two morons inane chatter again was the last thing I needed to do if I wanted to avoid a mental breakdown.

I walked down the hall to the open patio beside the elevator and decided to enjoy a well deserved smoke.

Three cigarettes later, I returned to the room and noticed my cell display showed no active call. I chuckled to myself and turned the recorder off. I detached the cell phone form the charger and dialed Ed's number.

"Hey Ed," I greeted smugly. "Nah, I stepped out for a smoke. So how long did it take for before you quit?"

I laughed at the time he responded with.

"Fifteen huh? Well, that's five more than I figured you'd last," I continued with a laugh. "And remember I had to deal with that for two hours."

"Come on Ed. You seriously expect me not to have already followed that angle?" I responded to his inquiry as I hit the speaker button and set the phone on the table again. "Those two were the only ones of note that are still available to interview."

"What about McVicker?" asked Ed.

"Got caught with an under-aged hooker during a televised police raid. Died of a heart attack at the scene… on camera" replied.

"Yikes… What about the Gym Instructor?" asked Ed accompanied by the sound of shuffling paper. "What was it… ah, Buzzcut."

"Signed up for another tour of duty at the start of the second Gulf War," I advised. "Died in a fire fight somewhere south of Baghdad in '08."

"Van Driessen?" Ed asked.

"Moved to some farming town in southern India in '09 and dropped off the grid," I informed.

Ed continued to list off names of Highland High faculty and I continued to explain why they couldn't be interviewed.

"I did my homework on this one Ed," I reminded my producer. "These two were it."

A string of apologies came from the other end of the line. Normally, I would have eaten them up since Ed wasn't one to apologize (no matter how wrong he was), but at this point I just wanted to get as far away from Highland, TX (and more specifically Beavis and Butt-Head) as soon as possible.

"With how fast the other channels and publications are running to interview the primaries, at least we know why no one else beat us to this interview," I said with a tired laugh. "And that warning Eichler gave us makes a whole lot more sense now."

"Anyway, I think we're done here. Just run with Sarah's interview with Ruttheimer and we should have plenty to compete with the other channels."

Ed gave me assurances and more apologies then hung up. I grabbed a quick shower before my cameraman Danny and I checked out of the hotel and hopped in the rental car. We were halfway to the interstate when traffic stopped dead.

I rolled my window down and leaned my head out to try and see what was holding things up. I noticed a figure I had hoped to forget.

Beavis was pacing back and forth in the middle of the intersection with his shirt pulled over his head so that only his face was visible, poking out of the neck hole. I couldn't make out what he was saying due to distance but he seemed to rambling something that sounded almost like Spanish.

"Hey isn't that…" began Danny as he craned his head out of his window.

"Looks like it," I responded.

"What is he doing?" asked Danny with a confused expression on his face.

"No clue," I responded as I noticed a local police officer moving towards the congested intersection.

"Hey!" I yelled to get the cop's attention. "What's going on?"

"Oh, just the Roberts boy agin," said the cop tiredly with a thick Texan twang as he walked over to stand beside the car. "Looks like he's all wound up again."

"This happen often?" I asked intrigued as, aside from an impressive level of general ignorance and immaturity, I hadn't seen anything to even hint at this type of behavior in the man earlier.

"Not s'much after we got the docs to OK a ban on caffeine 'n high sugar foods to 'im'n his buddy a few years back," informed the officer. "Wonder what set'm off this time."

I cringed as I remembered leaving the box of donuts and coffee behind when I ended the interview. Neither Danny nor I thought anything of it at the time, but realized that this incident was indirectly my fault.

The cop looked up as I noticed the traffic ahead of me began moving again. As I put the car in gear I saw Beavis heading down the sidewalk in our direction. He still had his shirt pulled over his head and was walking with a sort of bouncing gait. As he got near I could here his babbling.  
>"I must find Lake Titicaca!" exclaimed Beavis in a high pitched staccato voice. "I will breach their walls and steal all of their TP!"<p>

"Now Beavis, you head on home son," said the cop calmly.

"Home? What is this home you speak of? Will they have TP, there?" the blonde asked.

"I'm sure your momma'll have all the TP you need," assured the officer. "You just head on and she'll take care o' ya."

"Yes!" exclaimed Beavis in an almost evil manner. "I will go to this 'Home'. They will bring forth all of their TP as an offering to the Great Bunnnng-Holllle. They will fall down in worship! The streets will be red with the blood of the non-believers!"

With that pronouncement, Beavis turned and bounce-stalked down the sidewalk, presumably on his way home.

I blinked several times and glanced at Danny. He had his handheld out following the young man's departure.

"Please tell me you got that," I stated with a grin.

"Every moment as soon as I saw him in the street pacing," returned Danny without turning away form the departing Beavis.

"Eichler won't touch this," I pondered as I wheeled the car through the intersection and into the first parking space I could find.

After a moment a thought occurred to me and I dialed a number on my cell.

"Hey Mike… I got something you might be interested in," I said with a smile.


	5. Partial Recall

This snippet was inspired in Feb 2014 by a comment by Waylander on PPMB for the Iron Chef challenge Jake Morgendorffer Isn't

The premise of the IC was that Jake Morgendorffer wasn't who he actually seemed or claimed to be.

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><p><strong>PARTIAL RECALL<strong>

Jake held Helen from behind.

After getting the best of her in a close quarters gun/knife fight, both bruised and bleeding from various scrapes, cuts and nicks. The living room of Schloss Morgendorfer is trashed. Both of Helen's arms are pinned in one of Jake's large hands above her head. His other arm is secured tightly in a choke hold around her neck, with her captured gun in that hand.

"I'm not your wife," Helen managed to squeak out through the hold Jake had around her neck.

"The hell you're not!" Jake yelled angrily while maintaining his hold on the woman.

"I swear to God!" Helen eeked out in a raspy panicked voice, as the edges of her vision began to get blurry. "I never saw you before last year! Our marriage is just a memory implant!"

"You think I'm an idiot?" Jake asked rhetorically as he stared down at her reddening face from behind.

Helen raised an eyebrow, but didn't actually say anything further. Both because it wouldn't have been wise in the current situation, and she didn't think she could due to the increasingly diminishing air resulting from Jake's well muscled forearm and bicep squeezing down on her windpipe.

"Don't answer that," said Jake as he loosened his hold enough for Helen to draw several deep coughing of much needed air.

"I remember our wedding," he spat bitterly.

"It was implanted by the Agency," Helen replied weakly after her coughing subsided.

"And falling in love?" Jake continued.

"Implanted," Helen answered after a pause that did not go unnoticed by Jake.

"Our friends? My job? Your job? 20-plus years together," Jake counted off in quick succession, his voice getting louder with each question. "I suppose all this was implanted too, huh?"

"The job's are real," Helen informed him. "But the Agency set them up."

"Bullshit!" swore Jake,as pushed her roughly onto the living room couch with the arm he had been using to choke her.

He kept the gun in his other hand trained on her as he watched her right herself from her sprawl, into a more comfortable sitting position.

The buxom woman made a point of doing so slowly, with her hands clearly visible to her armed and increasingly irate "husband".

"They erased your identity and implanted a new one," she continued as she rubbed her bruised neck. "I was written in as your wife so I could watch you. To make sure the erasure took. Your whole life is just a dream. Sorry, Jakey."

"Don't you dare call me that any more," he spat.

"What about my parents?" he asked after (for Helen at least) a very uncomfortable minute of silence.

"From your dossier, they died when you were in your late teens," she answered.

Jake blinked, taken aback for a split second, but quickly recovered.

"So you're telling me that my entire history was made up, and the best they could do was a horrendously abusive childhood under a tyrant of a man that left me an emotional and psychological wreck for what will probably be the rest of my days?" Jake ranted.

"Actually, the memories of your parents are mostly real from what I understand," replied Helen with a visible wince at Jake's comments. "Apparently, the trauma associated with them was... is, so severe that even the brain swappers didn't want to play with them, for fear of everything else unraveling. So they kept the core of those experiences intact and simply played with the details. Names, mostly."

"What about the girls?" Jake asked in a low and very menacing tone. "If we've only been together for a year, where did our 'daughters' come from?"

"Daria and Quinn are were picked up from an Agency funded orphanage," answered Helen. "Their memories were altered the same way yours were."

"O.K. then. If I'm not me, then who the hell am I?" Jake asked in a slightly more calm voice as he slowly settled into the love seat directly across form the couch, keeping his eyes and gun trained on Helen.

"Beats me," Helen said with a shrug and a sigh. "That particular bit of intel was left out of your dossier."

Jake rubbed his forehead with his free hand and took several long calming breaths.

"But Jake, ...There's something I want you to know," said Helen in a suddenly sweet voice. "You're the best,... well OK, one of the better assignments I ever hand. Really."

"I'm honored," Jake responded sarcastically with a sneer.

"I'm serious, Jake," Helen said with conviction. "Believe me, I've been an agency operative for 20 years. I had some pretty shitty assignments in the past that required me to do a lot of things I'd happily take a memory implant or two to forget. But being your wife, and getting to play at being a normal family is something I never expected to get."

"Uh, huh," said Jake with a completely unconvinced expression.

"And definitely never expected it to be as... fulfilling as it's proven to be..." continued Helen. "And of course the sex was always amazing."

"OK, now you're just trying to butter me up again," Jake returned, his guard immediately back up and his tone all business.

"Believe me if you want to or not," said Helen with a mischievous smirk "But I have to admit that not having to fake it was probably the hands down best unexpected perk of this assignment."

"Good to know I could at least do **_something_ **right by you for a change," remarked Jake bitterly.

"You sure you don't wanna...," began Helen with that wicked smirk still in place. "For old time's sake."

"You have got to be kidding," replied Jake with a completely incredulous expression.

"If you don't trust me, you can tie me up," offered Helen, her hands crossed at the wrist and held out in front of her as she bat her thick eyelashes at Jake.

"Why Helen, I didn't know you were so kinky," Jake responded sarcastically. "Oh wait, yes I did, since you were the one who bought the horse and Jockey outfit."

* * *

><p>Richter and four Agency thugs entered the house through various points of Schloss Morgendorfer. They sweep the 1st floor, and converged on the stairs.<p>

Richter nodded for the thugs to go up first.

Guns at the ready, they checked each room giving the clear sign.

Richter did a double-take after looking into the smaller bedroom at the top of the stairs. It was lined with wall padding like one would see in a mental institute. After blinking for a moment, he closed the door and continued down the hall, towards the master bedroom.

Richter nodded again, and one of the thugs kicked in the door as another of his fellows rushed into the room. The thug who kicked in the door fell back into the hallway, with a new hole in the middle of his forehead. Simultaneously, the sound of breaking glass emanated from within the room, followed by silence and no further response from the man who had entered the room.

"Shit," whispered Richter to himself as he quickly backed off to seek better cover in the doorway of the empty room across the hall.

He gave another silent nod to the two remaining muscle, who had taken up defensive positions on either side of the doorway.

Sadly, Ricther then watched as the two thugs suddenly cried out as splatters of blood and plaster manifested near their heads from shots inside the room.

"Shit!" he swore again as he reflexively ducked further down and thumbed back the hammer of his gun.

"Jake, come out peacefully," he shouted. "We can resolve this without any more bloodshed."

"Yeah,... I'll think about it," came Jake's voice from withing the bedroom. "Come back later."

Richter managed to quietly make his way to the master bedroom's door, and peeked quickly in. He took note of Jake's shirtless, bruised and lacerated back, as well as his man hanging half in and half out of a blood-stained, broken window.

Righter spun into the room and drew a solid bead on Jake from behind.

"Look Jake, I can have ten more guys up here in seconds," Richter explained smugly. "Just give it up, and come with me."

After a few seconds of no response coming from the shirtless man, Richter continued, "You can do this the easy way, or I can put a few extra holes in you now, and still get what I want."

Helen, from her place on her knees on the opposite side of Jake, peeked out from the side of Jake's hips. Before Richter could ask, his eyes grew wide as he noticed a glint.

He had enough time to make out Helen's bound hands, holding her gun, extended up towards him from between Jake's slightly parted legs, before a single suppressed gun shot was heard. A hole blossomed in the middle of Richter's forehead, just below his receding hairline a second or two before the chief Agency enforcer's now lifeless body fell to the floor in the doorway.

"He said come back later," said Helen in an annoyed tone as she pulled the gun back to her ample chest and offered it back up to Jake.

After he accepted the weapon from her with a grin, Jake watched her use the fingers of her still tied right hand to almost daintily wipe the corners of her lipstick smeared mouth.

"Now where were we, before we were so rudely interrupted?"she asked as she looked back up at Jake with a sultry expression.


End file.
